April 2008 Archives
Consequences of Actions
Apr 30, 2008
The obese kid says "Stay away from sweets", muralled atop of our Soho design studio vending machine. (Given the high volume of decent food joints within a sharpies throw of the studio and the disproportionate number of colleagues cycling to work I can't see a huge amount of vending action happening).
"No Dumping - only water down the drain" in San Francisco, below.
For every (potentially harmful) action, the mechanism through which the consequences of actions occur. The ability to introduce more reflective moments into the design process. And the the future perfect of consequences.
Kstm Designer Laptop
Apr 30, 2008
This designer specifically. Yeah, his other one's a thin slice of fruit.
Sign of the Economy/Economy of the Sign
Apr 30, 2008
From the corridors of power.
English Caff Condiment Norms
Apr 29, 2008
Today's office starts early ends late.
When we walk in at half five in the morning - the only other punters are a couple of road sweepers their hands wrapped around hot and heavily sugared tea. Our orders arrive - my Korean eating companion being introduced to the culinary tomfoolery of bubble and squeak, and we spend the next 90 minutes working through breakfast and a presentation that in an perfect parallel universe would have been finished days ago. A few hours from now we'll be standing and delivering to 6-score journalists from around the world, invited to a 'behind the scenes look at our new London design studio. No pressure then.
It occurs to me that time travel is made for moments like this to either rewind back a day or two and work on the presentation or fast forward to the muted post-delivery applause.
Bringing work conversations into this place of full-English worship is passable when most of the seats are empty, but grows increasingly unacceptable to this author as the tables fill. That's not strictly true - its not the conversation that's an issue as much as the presence of an opened laptop.
I'm reminded of an interview with a cafe manager in Brighton who talked about the different ways that laptop wielding customers would be 'encouraged' to leave - through repeated cleaning of the table around the customer, asking whether they wanted to order anything else, then under the customer's plate, then (jokingly) that he would clean the table with bleach. From tutting to bleaching. Part of the issue with laptops being perceived as anti-social is that it is a black box - you could be engaged in a task that takes 5 minutes or 5 hours, an uncertainty that creates tension. What is it that makes using a mobile phone or reading a newspaper acceptable, but using a laptop not?
Back out on the street we realise we have no idea where our new London design studio is. In the rain and in a hurry is not the time to piss around with a newly installed map application. The GPS equipped phone is parked in the back pocket and we ask a friendly cabbie for directions.
Some days are bigger than others, apparently.
Luckily we both pack a decent supply of adrenaline.
Stiffness in an Otherwise Flexible World
Apr 28, 2008
The length of time it takes for objects to mold and give to the contours of your body? In a world of smaller objects made from more flexible components - the motivations for keeping objects stiff to the point of being uncomfortable?
Why this photo? The newish biometric passports includes an RFID tag that stiffens the entire passport to the point that it can no-longer comfortably be carried in a trouser back pocket. Though given the rigours of the road I have my doubts how long the RFID tag will last anyway.
And the footwear? One week to wear in a new pair of crampon-stiff-soled boots - a snow covered Mt. Fuji beckons. So if you see me walking-like-a-dork around the mothership today, that'll be why.
A Better Thing
Apr 27, 2008
Fortunately during the upcoming week I'll be double-billing with colleague Younghee who co-incidentally starts the next leg of her truly nomadic existence with a move to London.
The photo of her reading the Assignments Aboard Times taken during last year's study in Mumbai. We're sitting in the lobby of our Dharavi hotel waiting for a breakfast of dhal and sweet lassi to arrive, watching the pedestrian traffic negotiate the monsoon weather through the doorway, and listening to religious intonations from a shrine along the corridor.
A wiser person than me accurately described our endless journeying as a holiday romance without the holiday, and without the romance - friendships and respect forged from working through blood, sweat and occasionally tears. In a world of change, our framing of history is the only constant.
A Good Thing
Apr 27, 2008
Once more into the breach - heading to Helsinki/London for the week, including a full day in the company of the fourth estate. A little fear is a good thing, right?
Info! Pick! Up!
Apr 26, 2008
QR bar codes positioned at the exit of Omotesando station - point your mobile phone camera at the code and be redirected to a mobile website listing the surrounding area. You'd probably think twice about calling a phone number placed in the same spot and advertising the same service - so ultimately how does the expectation of what happens next differ depending on the medium through which additional information is requested?
As to whether this is truly destined for mainstream adoption? Keep eyes peeled for street hacks.
Related: out of date annotation in Helsinki, the freshness of sex service advertising in London.
When Localisation Comes to This
Apr 26, 2008
Local Japanese colour variations of this recently launched feature rich product. Compare this to competing (with itself) on (pantone) colour.
D [Arrow] A [Arrow] - Counter Wayfinding
Apr 26, 2008
Spend more than a few years in Japan, most likely you'll have enjoyed numerous visits to the immigration building - a short drab bus ride from Shinagawa Station. Monotonous but, from experience far more pleasant than its Berlin or London equivalents.
The [A] counter handles re-entry permits.
Visual Flow
Apr 25, 2008
Oral. Ablutions
Apr 24, 2008
Restaurant bathroom includes a dental floss dispenser - from last year's study in Rio de Janeiro.
Dental Aspirations
Apr 24, 2008
Dental advertising from Hue (above) and Lhasa (below).
And the use of a dental brace vehicle for status in in Bangkok.
Cultural Stereotypes: Thief
Apr 23, 2008 | 11 Comments
Hospital poster warning against theft - uses an image of a stereotypical thief in Japan: male; chubby; bearded or with a few day's stubble; local i.e. Japanese; wearing plain clothes with a hood; swag carried in a sack made out of cloth with the corners tied and slung over one shoulder. If animated: walking quietly on tiptoe.
Given our increasing ability to digitally observe and retrospectively identify thieves - whether this stereotype will change? Given the awareness that more diligent members of this profession are likely to have for surveillance, whether awareness will lead to a generalisable (or stereotypeable) shift in appearance?
What does a stereotypical thief look like in your country? Answers in the comments below...
Anticipatory Preparation
Apr 23, 2008
Pre-Paid TV
Apr 23, 2008
Evolving from coin to card to...
With more media being carried, and the occasional benefits of big-screen over small - business models that enable infrastructure roll-out and usage.
Monday Morning Commute
Apr 21, 2008 | 1 Comment
This morning's office is cramped to say the least - my nose is pressed up against the collar of a salariman whose fresh pomade and comb induced rice rows (the local unintentional equivalent of cornrows) I am now intimately familiar. Just to my right a lady is reluctantly pressing her petit, squishy breast against my rib cage propelled by an influx of yet more pushing bodies. To my left a row of four heads are dipped, dozing and by co-incidence the angle of each head perfectly reveals a bald spot in the rough of each of the four suited gents. In a future perfect world of augmented reality slot machines (motto - 'pattern match, win prizes') four-in-a-row is a definite winner. But right now, having staked a claim on some the few seats in this rush hour train the dozed are snoozing through their jackpot.
As it leaves the station, the mass of bodies start to settle and the muscular tension that was countering its acceleration starts to dissipate.
Every space has its own etiquette but few as fascinating, and as fascinatingly dense as the Tokyo subway during rush hour. For trains traveling in from the 'burbs every additional stop before a mainline destinations like Shibuya ratchets up the pressure - no-one leaves, a brave few take a breath and enter.
It's rare to have the opportunity to enjoy this Monday morning commute - cycling being my regular vehicle of choice and Tokyo being eminently cycleable, so subway journey's like today are a novel experience to be savoured. The Denentoshi becomes the Ginza becomes the Marunouchi in this cross-town safari to my ultimate destination - a hospital in Ochanomizu.
Let the week begin.
Hospital Gift Norms
Apr 21, 2008
Elasticity of (Anti) Social Spaces
Apr 20, 2008
Mobile phones used in this Ochanomizu hospital, restricted to phone booths. In a world of smaller more discreet objects, how to know what activity a person is engaged in? The extent to which the anti-social aspects of that activity (externalities) are noticed by people in proximity? Or that these behaviours can be analysed retrospectively? The effect that knowing someone's historical behaviour will effect their current behaviour.
Related - a dedicated mobile phone booth in this lounge in Copenhagen airport, cutting down on the mobility of smokers in Tokyo.
Object Darwinism
Apr 20, 2008
Jagarico no Barcode
Apr 20, 2008
Tech Dunes
Apr 19, 2008
It took three year's to fill 48 page passport, and three working days to apply for a replacement.
Despite the proximity of an automatic passport photo booth to the British embassy in Tokyo - applicants are directed to a human mediated studio with a "he knows how to take them just right". The rules for what make an acceptable photo have tightened up and what was once OK, no longer is. Thought for today: the extent that higher quality and more prevalent tools to re-produce stuff - from photo printers to 3D copiers, leads to changes in the rules for acceptable submissions - like sand dunes rolling in parallel across a desert.
Neighbourhood photos studios are window's to the community: from the photo booth without a camera in Brazil; photo enhancement services in Ho Chi Minh City; the aspirational nature of the backdrops in Lhasa and New Orleans night club.
And the gent in a wicker basket/helmet? Last year's motorbike driver taking me to his favoured photo studio in Fujian Province.
Service designer's out there might like the guidelines for submitting appropriate photos presumably based on tens of thousands of inappropriate submissions. Photos should be: not to close; too far; mustn't show another person; have a busy background - think flock wallpaper; be to blurry or too light; have shadows across the face; be looking away; portrait style - body at 45degrees, face looking at camera; mouth open; hair across eyes; frames covering eyes; dark tinted glasses; wearing a hat; face covered. Download the full guidelines for applicants and guidelines for photo studios.
Disembodied Voices II
Apr 18, 2008
Customers of this vending machines situated in Izu Koogen station are talked through the process of obtaining a new travel pass by a remotely located assistant - the machine includes a scanner, highlighted in the photo below, for passing on printed information. If you were to take the red-eye from Tokyo to Salt Lake City and pull your rental into the parking lot of this bagel bakery - standing at the check-out you might unsure whether the server is talking to you, or some remote other. In any given retail context to what extent do you want or expect a human server to be the interface between you and, speaking broadly here, that retail experience?
And in a world of manufactured retail experiences and advertising everywhere the ability and desire of consumers to engage and disengage on their own terms is helped by a deep arsenal of tools - from reading materials to sunglasses, to personal stereos and headphones, to (seemingly) talking on a mobile phone.
Sometimes the inquisitive researcher has to partake in a bit of anti-social behaviour to figure out the boundaries of things - Kate Fox gives an lovely example of deliberately queue jumping in an pub in her book Watching the English - the Hidden Rules of English Behaviour and if you're British your stomach's probably just knotted up thinking about her reaction to their reaction so ingrained are our behavioural norms . And so it was yesterday in the Shibuya Apple store going through an entire browsing and purchasing process - avoiding eye contact with the trained-to-acknowledge-your-presence-within-x-seconds greeters and keeping 'buds firmly in-ears to avoid any form of verbal interaction with the check-out staff. (Whilst raw this break down of an Apple store retail experience has a lot going for it). My own deliberately disengaged experience felt wrong, the body language of the servers and in particular the check-out staff indicated social discomfort, but as a consumer in a carefully crafted retail environment boy was it self-empowering.
(Yeah, I know, Apple, Competitor. But I could equally be talking about experiences closer to home. And no, this wasn't a formal experiment, I do occasionally need to shop y'know)
In our increasingly sensor rich world the arms race for your sensory attention is stepping up a gear. As a consumer sometimes the only way to step back is to kick back. New weapons for the disengaged consumer and the engaging retailer are just around the corner, more of which later.
Sort of related: advertising and the value of you is that you are here.
Newspaper Vending Norms
Apr 18, 2008
Business 24/7 vending machine includes a 45 degree angled slot for retrieving newspaper from Dubai above and a typical US style Wall Street Journal vending machine from Washington DC below.
Vending machines are not particularly common in the United Arab Emirates - but I’m guessing that ex-pat customers will be broadly familiar with the US style of buying vended newspapers - if not hands-on then from exposure to popular/unpopular culture. To what extent does transparency - both of what is inside the machine and how the machine works effect the purchasing experience? Standing in front of this machine - what goes through your mind?
Are any newspaper’s left? How sure am I that the paper on the inside is the same as the one on the outside? What is the perceived likelihood that the machine will simply swallow the coins and not deliver - due to some kind of mechanical or cosmic failure? What is the actual likelihood of failure? And how does this perception change through use or observing other people’s use? That little moment of panic when you’re down to your last Dirham or Euro or quarter. Does someone nearby offer a vending-free alternative way to purchase the same thing? And given all this what % of willing consumers standing in front the Business 24/7 vending machine end up walking away, coins still in pocket?
And in world that’s increasingly shifting to digital to what extent does any of this matter? Is the purpose of the machine to vend? Or to remind consumers that the content exists and to facilitate access to the that digital content?
Related: shortening the path through key-words and QR bar codes.
Squatting Evolved
Apr 17, 2008
During our Chongqing morning session we came across numerous folk hurrying along to somewhere carrying small stools. It turned out they were all heading to a seminar sponsored by a medical company (below) in a place where seating was not supplied.
Do you live in a culture where its normal to sit or squat? How does this impact the (seating) infrastructure you expect to find, and in which context? How does it impact what you are likely to carry? And (gosh) if you design things that people carry (how) does this affect their likely interaction preferences?
Packaging/Display Norms
Apr 17, 2008
Bean sprouts from a neighbourhood vegetable market, sprout-head facing outwards - rounding off today's Chongqing detour.
Table Annotation
Apr 17, 2008
The advantages and disadvantages of annotating the table itself (from street side cafe above) versus a fixed point of reference proximate to the table (below) - both photos from Chongqing.
The extent that an object is expected to move in relation to its surroundings? And how this, and our ability to track objects changes in our future perfect world where objects have a degree of autonomous mobility?
Motivations for Protecting
Apr 17, 2008
Chopsticks covered with a plastic sheet - in line with colleague Younghee's thread on freshness and protection (that's her in the baseball cap, below). Given that you might expect (rain) water to be associated with it's cleaning properties - to what extent are the chopsticks covered because a damp wooden chopstick behaves and tastes differently to a dry one? Or that it is locally assumed that the rain carries with it pollution? - whilst this pot of 'sticks was exposed to the rain, more sheltered pots were not similarly covered.
These photos are from Chongqing during a wake-up-with-the-city walk - one of the research methods we use to orientate ourselves with a new location. We awoke at some unreasonable hour it was raining hard, a due to distinct lack of umbrellas had to dance our way through the deluge to eventually grab breakfast of steaming congee, deep fried sugar-flour washed down by soy milk - morsels of choice for manual labourers, students and hungry researchers alike. Good times. A little more here.
Air Hacks: Tangible Reminders
Apr 16, 2008
Part of the protocol of coming into land is checking that bathrooms are clear and locking the door - by lifting the lavatory flap and locking from the outside. During a recent United flight the seen-everything attendants placed a small plastic cup just so on each of the doors. But why a cup and why in this location?
The cup happens to be the object to hand - the door includes a small water fountain and a stack of cups; its positioning acts as a sufficiently out of place visual and tangible reminder to unlock the lavatory; and by being wedged under a well sprung metal flap it reduces the likelihood of broken finger nails. Simple. Effective.
Moral Authorities/Services
Apr 16, 2008
Unclaimed (or spare) shoes outside this Bur Dubai mosque.
Looking at the infrastructure and objects around your neighbourhood - what is free to take, what can you use and in what contexts, and what is off-limits? To what extent does the moral authority of the mosque extend to these shoes? And as with the back-alley wall annotated with shrine symbols (photo from Sangenjaya, below) how can this authority be extended to other objects and services? What do you assume to upload to a Yahoo branded web-hosting service? What about a hosting service provided by this mosque? So yeah, at what point does the Vatican muscle into the web hosting business?
Now switch your assumptions about 'moral authority' from the perspective of a devout atheist.
Kind of related: the practice of leaving bags on the streets of Urumqi.
Design Elements that Say "Bicycle"
Apr 16, 2008
When It's Acceptable to Overfill
Apr 16, 2008
The extent that overfilling is part of the experience and the infrastructure that is required to support this.
Photos show: sake from a Shimokitazawa izakaya; an Izu Koogen balcony bath wet rooms being the norm in Japan; and for this coffee-junkie at least, the ritualistic filling of a cafetière to the brim to ensure that grits make it into the cup.
Digital equivalents?
Tasks Supported
Apr 16, 2008
In JR Shibuya station booking office.
(Lack of ) Visual Authority
Apr 16, 2008
Why this stop sign has less authority then you should expect?
More on deferring authority, and how it plays out in our future perfect.
Tools for Mobile Activists
Apr 15, 2008The presentation-lite slides from last week's Global Philanthropy Forum panel on Early Warning: Listening, Technology, Activism can be downloaded from here (PowerPoint, 2MB).
To recap the framing discussion: that for many the mobile phone is their primary video/photo/audio capturing and sharing device and as such their skills surpass what you might expect. The photo below from the streets of Cairo shows a screen shot from a mobile phone movie that re-created scenes from the Godfather shot and edited entirely on the mobile phone (the gent in the photo isn't an activist just someone whose mobile phone editing skills are highly evolved, and yeah the pixelation is just to maintain a degree privacy); that a person's understanding of what happens when they use mobile technology can be significantly out of sync with what actually happens - something that system designers sometimes refer to as the user's mental model. It doesn't necessarily matter that the mental model differs from how it actually works - but it can quickly become an issue if that person is trying to try out new features, recover from an error or say, wants to stay one step ahead of the authorities. Examples from both ends of the spectrum of understanding: Ken Banks talking about activists in Pakistan using Frontline SMS whilst riding around the city in a truck to reduce the risk of detection by base-station triangulation, to an interviewee in Tehran (but could equally be an example from my/your country) assuming that a voice mail message stored on the phone's memory was out of reach of prying government ears - never mind that the message originally passed over the network which may be monitored. The spread of tools that can capture experiences means that more people are in a position to document and publish (human rights) abuses - including many ad-hoc activists who wont be aware that of the relative ease of tracing communication - and this in a world before the widespread adoption of geo-tagged photos.
But why use a photo of a street signs in Tehran as an example of mental models? Explanation here.
The three things on the device that will impact the spread of activist material in emerging markets and beyond: lower device cost's are broadening the base of who can afford a feature rich mobile phone - putting more people in a position to capture and communicate what they see and hear; memory prices are rapidly dropping and sufficiently-large-for-storing-media memory capacity will filter down into the lowest cost handsets increasing the range of what is stored and the ability to communicate via the sneaker net - photos and video passed from hand to hand, rather than say sent over the network; and mobile phones equipped with TV Out e.g. N82 will leverage existing big-screen infrastructure and practices. I'm less sure of this last one - but included because most people aren't aware of the feature.
After the session Gigi Brisson asked a smart question about the likely strategies for staying one step ahead of whomever is trying to snoop - the simplest is single or limited use communication tools e.g. using one SIM/phone used for a single conversation before disposing of it. Whether this is affective assumes other factors such as buying from different sources, varying the location from which the communication is carried out, encrypting what is communicated and so on and on. Even though countries like Japan or India are supposed to register pre-paid SIM card consumers at point of purchase there are enough lost, stolen or hacked SIM cards/phones to create a steady supply. NGO's looking for a comprehensive solution should start with Benetech and in particular Martus - with thanks James Fruchterman for the pointer.
Back to the panel - ta to Mitul Shah for hosting, and Mark Smolinski, Erik Hersman and of course the attendees for making it the first panel I've actually enjoyed. Photos in the slides from Accra, Ayni, Cairo, Delhi, Seoul and Tehran.
Form / Alignment
Apr 15, 2008
Related: the alignment of license plates in Chongqing, street annotation in Pasadena and curbs in Tokyo that reveal the geometry of the city.
Static, Then Evolution
Apr 15, 2008
The pieces of infrastructure that become fixed reference points - which then evolve over time. From my local 'hood, Sangenjaya.
Advertising Norms
Apr 14, 2008
Street accommodation advertising from Bur Dubai includes: “for South Indian”; “Keralite preferred”; “for Muslim bachelor” and “decent executive Muslim bachelors”.
For service designers: whether to explicitly support categorisation based on race, religion, geography? In a world with more personal data floating around whether we're likely to see this extended to: social network; sexual history; STD status; credit rating?
Update: reader Alexander Baxevanis points out that stating a discriminatory preference of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status, handicap or disability is illegal in the US - for example articulated for Craigslist users here.
Shall We Overcome?
Apr 14, 2008
Want to know to what extent your multi-cultural colleagues really get on with one another? Consider for a moment whom they hang out with over lunch - whilst behavioural norms are reasonably well defined for how to behave in the workplace - people tend to 'switch off' on their lunch hour - hanging out with people with the same cultural, food and language preferences. It takes effort do otherwise, something that in part implies a degree of respect.
That's not to say that this kind of voluntary segregation is negative - it probably contributes to the 'recharging' process - particularly for people who spend most of their time speaking [English] as a second language.
Photo: the highly ritualistic tea making process from the streets of Xiamen. And yeah, back home in Tokyo enjoying a 3am permalag induced start to the working week.
NYT, Links
Apr 13, 2008
Reader's arriving from the New York Times might appreciate the following links: a short essay on the speed at which mobile phones are making their way around the planet here; a list of research and downloads here; and if for some reason you're seduced by the idea of life on the road, re-align your thinking with the thread titled today's office.
The main study mentioned in the article focussed on communities in Mumbai (photos above, below), Accra, Rio de Janerio and Chongqing.
It's common for the media to tell a story through an individual - the simple fact is that a lot of people's hard work goes into making these studies happen - and not everyone has the opportunity (or ego) to put out there. Thanks to the NYT and the article's ever-so-patient author, Sara Corbett for giving us the opportunity to share with a wider audience.
If you want to keep in touch with where all this research is heading send an email to subscribe @ janchipchase.com.
New Perspectives Changing Value
Apr 13, 2008
In a world of ubiquitous aerial, street level or [insert new way of seeing] imagery the extent that new views enhance or depreciate the the financial value of what is seen?
One aspect of living in a cul-de-sac's is the assumption of a greater degree of privacy than say, a through road. Whether contempory tools tools should build this assumption into the granularity/detail of what is shown on aerial maps? And for whom? And given this sadistic brave new world how increased discoverability plays out in sales for new property developments such as the cul-de-sacs of the Palms islands in Dubai (pictured).
Related: threads on privacy and wayfinding.
The Streetz R Mine (For a Little While)
Apr 13, 2008
One more night before shipping back to Tokyo. By co-incidence my first proper field study started less than a block away from tonight's hotel, here in downtown San Francisco. Looking back, 2002 was the year of the big break - another corporate re-organisation created a business unit with a brief to broaden the accessory offering and someone with a budget decided to invest in a bit of in-house qualitative field research: carry out a multi-cultural study to explore what people carry and why and use the results to inform and inspire the design process. Easy. And easily enough rope to hang ourselves.
The plan was to meet my then Swedish co-conspirator Per in San Francisco - before embarking on 10 days of interviews, home visits, shadowing and observations. We both had a loose background in user centered design but neither of us were 'qualified' in the academic sense of the word, so we planned the study to death, figures out a spread of data gathering techniques to collect what we wanted to know, did what we felt was right and got on with the job. Some things worked, some didn't, no-one died. The data and our figure-it-out-as-we-go-along way of working triggered a wave of new ideas - which in turn fed into the design process.
After assessing the findings from San Francisco we headed to Milan, Berlin and eventually Shanghai - our understanding deepening to the point where patterns were starting to emerge - similarities and differences across cultures, gender, age. It was the playground of choice for the inquisitive mind: shadowing an architect in a Berlin winter; putting up Christmas decorations at 5am with the employees of a Shanghai bar/brothel whilst listening to tales of business on the streets; unsuccessfully trying to track down graffiti artists in Milan; buying bicycles in Shanghai to negotiate the city. And figuring out that if, on our departure donated the project bikes it brought a hidden intent of our research full circle.
A few steps on a long and continuing journey.
Called to gate and after two weeks on the road looking forward to a place called home.
Nomads Digitised, Abuses Communicated
Apr 12, 2008 | 4 Comments
The Economist published a special report on digital nomads that includes contributions from colleagues and peers. The future perfectesque addition comes the form of a phone-in diary of life on the road (hosted on the economist site here) that spanned a week in Tokyo and Seattle.
In situations where we need to collect data, where it's inappropriate to be present in person we sometimes ask people to self-document their lives in the form of audio-visual diaries. From experience the results of self documentation can be a bit hit or miss, with participants often deciding to re-interpret the boundaries of the study on the fly, but when it works the results can be powerful. Whilst I prefer to be on the other side of the microphone/lens the use of Dropio to record voice mail messages was pretty painless and hei, its not as if I had to be asked to take photos. Is self-documentation appropriate for your study? Judge for yourself:
Abuses archived? Putting self documentation in the context this week's Global Philanthropy Forum take a look at Witness / The Hub - a participatory media site for bringing human rights abuses to a worldwide audience. And if there's any of our Ovi guys reading this ...
Passion Play
Apr 12, 2008
Struggling to ad-hoc recruit someone for a field study? Those little things that make it possible to identify members of the community you are after...
Related: personalisation from Japan, China and beyond.
Libre
Apr 12, 2008
Conversion Tools
Apr 12, 2008
How do you keep electronic objects charged with limited access to mains electricity?
In countries like Uganda we’ve seen solutions ranging from car batteries to street charging services and a relatively small amount of solar. One potential solution is the pull-cord charger - demonstrated by the Potenco team shortly after the Street Hacks talk - billed as generating enough power for 20 minutes of talk time from one minute of pulling. The design is still evolving - based on feedback from the field. In retrospect given the mechanical nature of the solution and the likely geography of its deployment perhaps it should have been part of the talk?
Street Hacks, Hacked
Apr 10, 2008The slides from tonights Street Hacks presentation with Duncan Burns are now available - download from here (PowerPoint, 7MB).
It's essentially an update to this essay including some slides relating to fakes, dual SIM card use and Remade - the phone concept literally made form nothing new. Related research lives here and sign up to receive notification of future research by sending an email to: subscribe @ janchipchase.com.
A fuller list of research contributers appears on the second slide. Thanks to Peter Merholz for hosting and for attendees for getting into the spirit of the discussion. It's a good sign when the 'presenters' leave knowing more than when we arrived. And on a personal note I don't think we've ever stood between a room full of people and boxes of fresh pizza and lived to tell the tale.
Slides from top to bottom: the prevelance of software and content on demand from the streets of Delhi to the local corner store in Cairo - but could equally be Shanghai or Tehran or ...; issues related to fake phones - in this case a 'Nokia' from the streets of Accra supporting dual SIM card slots - the phone shows two send and end keys; a digital repair manual hack showing how to switch frequency bands; and soliciting the opinions of market ladies on the streets of the Nima neighbourhood in Accra in new design concepts - a small part of the participatory design work that we've been doing.
Th Shrt Ww
Apr 09, 2008
Lest I forget or pass out from lack of sleep, the double on this bill will be Adaptive Path's Brandon Schauer presenting The Long Wow - delving into customer loyalty and seduceable moments. Two presentations for the price of none. Kick's of tomorrow at 6pm. Sign-up here.
Photo: SF last year.
We Envy You, We Do
Apr 09, 2008
Whilst in London I had the pleasure of catching up with two of the development team behind Dopplr - Matt’s Biddulph & Jones (it makes them sound like purveyors of fine leather saddles since 1860, and given the volume of facial hair they were sporting, they certainly look the part). Both exuded that warm glow that comes from knuckling down on something that they believe in, that has the opportunity to make a difference, and which is on track to, well, actually make a difference. For readers who haven’t come across it before Dopplr helps people who travel a lot connect with people they know who also travel a lot, with a reasonable pay-off for minimal effort. (It's free,sign up here).
The service recently introduced a carbon tracking feature that calculates the monthly and yearly footprint, and allows you to share this information with others. To what extent does publishing your carbon footprint change your travel intent?
Why we envy you? Becomes apparent when you first try out the carbon counting feature. More on transparency and the consumption of, say, very personal media here.
Today's Office
Apr 08, 2008
Today's office will last a good eight hours longer than normal so I'm settling in for the long haul. Seat 6F on United 955 to San Francisco to be precise.
A presentation on Street Hacks to sort through, an opportunity to reflect on the pleasantly tactile Remade. And until airlines start subsidising ticket prices with in-flight cellular coverage - no interruptions from people talking on their mobiles. There are (at least) two ways to make money from mobile phones on planes: charge an arm and a leg for connectivity; charge a premium for customers wanting to be out of listening range of anyone with cellular connectivity. What price sanity? Especially in the veritable goulash of cultural mobile phone usage norms that is a transatlantic flight.
A body that hasn't yet arrived in London, a mind that's trying to work through a half-week to be spent in the valley (Silicon not San Fernando), and a heart recalibrating the quickest route home to Tokyo. See you on the other side.
A Girl, Played
Apr 08, 2008
Donation, Trust
Apr 08, 2008
The extent that the format of what is donated affects the level of trust that the donation will reach the intended recipient. Given the traceability of the owner and the routes traveled by this Oyster travel-card - whether the donation is anonymous? From Liverpool Street Station above, and as a comparison from the streets of Tehran, below, with the future perfect of donations discussed here.
Due Warning
Apr 08, 2008
From outside the offices of W&K, London, purveyors of creativity.
Yeah, a. brief. stopover in London.
What's in a Name?
Apr 06, 2008
The Gulf News was running an advertisement to buy the rights to name one of Dubai's the new metro stations.
The speed of change in any given city and the opportunities for buying the naming rights that go with it. And the opportunities when more of what we think of as fixed infrastructure shifts to being mobile.
Photo? The Burj Dubai from the 'copter.
Customisation Norms
Apr 06, 2008
Compared to, say, the customisation of PDA's in Bangkok, auto-rickshaws in Delhi and phone covers in Tokyo or nasvai (dope) packaging in Tajikistan
Centralised, Distributed Identities
Apr 06, 2008
A P.O.Box provided as an additional, free service for customers of this Bur Dubai barber's shop (photo above) - one of many such boxes dotted around the neighbourhood. Below - the centralised P.O.Boxes of the central post office in downtown Accra.
As the one person in your neighbourhood with a full fledged mobile sever in your pocket - what identity related services will you provide?
Colour, Disinfect
Apr 06, 2008
The relative uniqueness of the Bur-Dubai barbering experience? Chai before starting, Bollywood tunes over the airwaves, and a pummeled back to round it all off. Certainly better than this in Accra and no offers to sell-up like in Seoul.
More from around the world.
Objects as Vehicles for Status & Affiliation
Apr 05, 2008
For most people, wrist watches not about time - they're merely a tool to project status and peer group affiliation. And bloody good at it they are too.
What makes the wrist watch so good at everything-but-time? For starters everyone understands and appreciates it's original functional purpose - something that provides a sufficient social excuse for it to be worn; that functionality is relevant both inside and outside the home; adaptability - a watch can be shown or hidden depending on how it is worn - with everyday actions such as reaching revealing glimpses of what lies beneath; it provides a large enough canvas to for subtleties such as colour, patterns, materials, cost, and brand to be appreciated at close range; and ultimately that as a worn object it can be brought into a range of social contexts.
Wrist watches that require some form of mechanical adjustment, like say a Paneria, have a slight advantage because the act of winding/adjusting creates an additional opportunity for others to discover, and when necessary the wearer can make a show of this process to increase discoverability.
Yeah, its not all people all of the time, but it is most people some of the time.
And yeah the mobile phone is elbowing its way into this territory - a broader range of social excuses to interact with and display the object, or even for the object to be a tool to interact with other people - think taking or sharing photos; broader control whether to use in a given context; and with features like ring-tones and wallpapers the ability to increase what is projected and to whom. For now at least a suitable vehicle.
The photo above? Taken during ad-hoc interviews in Accra - came across a group of middle aged gents animatedly playing the local equivalent of mankala. A generation of people for whom the wrist watch remains the vehicle of choice.
Acknowledged
Apr 05, 2008
Distinguishing Between Raised &Flat
Apr 05, 2008
Yellow denoting speed bumps.
Business Hours: Weekday's, Fridays
Apr 05, 2008
That, plus government weekends shifting from Thursday+Friday to Friday+Saturday. For service designers: the distinction between working and non-working days, and can change over time.
From You to I
Apr 05, 2008
You're in a country where you don't speak the lingo, having just hailed a taxi and you need explain to the driver where you want to go. If you have a mobile then at some point you've probably given a local, or an ex-local in a nearby time zone, a call and handed the phone to the driver (thanks CY, FI :)
What happens when you start sharing current location information with your peer group? Situations where: someone knows the local neighbourhood better than you do; has access to better data; or a more suitable device to view that data - right now they know where you are better than you do. "Where are you now?" doesn't go away with shared location awareness, it becomes "Where am I now?"
Court, Case
Apr 05, 2008
Motivations for Annotating
Apr 05, 2008
Arabic "Objects in the mirror are closer than they appear" etched onto the wing mirror in Dubai above, license plate etched on the mirror of a car in Uganda below, and the practice of leaving mobile phone number’s on car windshields in Seoul.
For Every Rule, Exceptions
Apr 02, 2008
Rules tell you a lot about a society, exceptions to the rules tell you more.
Exceptions for whom? And in what contexts?
A Fancier Looking Tread Mill
Apr 01, 2008
Flight out of Tokyo is delayed, resulting in a missed connection to Dubai. The earliest available alternative is an Emirates red-eye that leaves at midnight. What to do with 3 hours to kill in Beijing’s new Terminal 3?
Heh, like a kid in photogenic candy store.
Up close? Beijing Terminal 3 is the new Frankfurt Airport, airports are the new malls, and walking to the gate is the new mall walking.
The Freedom to Capture
Apr 01, 2008
Feedback mechanism for immigration at Beijing International Airport, compared to the depth and speed of feedback offered at Frankfurt airport.
Openly using a D-SLR camera in customs and immigration? Gosh, this must be China. What are the pre-requisites for a sousveillance society?
Visual Resistance II
Apr 01, 2008
A ceiling that, most of the time flows in the direction of the pedestrian traffic - in Beijing Capital International Airport. Compare to the visual flow/resistance of pedestrian crossings in Seattle.
Associating of Things and People
Apr 01, 2008
Method for associating orders with punters from Narita Airport. Compare it to this solution in a Singapore restaurant.
Street Hacks Presentation / SF
Apr 01, 2008
How long have you been using your current cell phone? And what happened to your previous one? If you live in a country like India, China or Ghana the answer is likely to involve the vibrant used phone market and, somewhere along the line the informal repair cultures - guys on the street who appear able to fix pretty much anything using little more than a flat surface a screwdriver and somehow, just the right knowledge.
Those of you who have followed this research and are based in the Bay Area are invited to a talk by myself and Nokia Design colleague Duncan Burns, titled Street Hacks: From Design Research to Prototype to kindly hosted by Adaptive Path. (AP also plan to present some new material, TBD)
Want to join? Details and sign up here
The presentation will highlight the mobile phone hacking skills available on the streets of cities from Accra and beyond, the sophisticated ecosystem of reverse engineered repair manuals and how it challenges our thinking about what it means to make and distribute and support our products. The presentation will also introduce Remade - a phone made from upcycled and recycled materials.
Surely something missing from title of the talk? Nah - just our intent to open up the discussion to how design research and design prototypes can be used to change how an organisation thinks and does. Or not. That's why it's called a discussion...
Oh yeah, photos from around Chengdu's mobile phone repair market - fake 8800 above, and repair services below. Tokyo this morning, Beijing (airport) for lunch, Dubai tomorrow. See you on the other side.
Here Come (Reports of) Violence
Apr 01, 2008
Those of you with interested in the role of mobile phones and other newish media tools in activism should take a look at Ushahidi.com a site to facilitate the reporting of acts of violence in post-election Kenya. For a broad range of other examples and a well articulated big picture I recommend Clay Shirky's new book Here Comes Everybody. And in the spirit of re-use I've got a well-thumbed copy of which I'm happy to pass on to anyone living in Tokyo.
Incidentally, the gent behind Ushahidi - Erik Hersman also contributes to Afrigadget will be in attendance and adding his voice to the discussion of this Street Hacks talk.
Photo from this in Rio de Janeiro.
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